Why are we still paying line rental charge?

[Shahin007]

I want this answer from Virgin staff please, not from mods or folks who are pretending to know what they’re saying.

From my understanding from working with competing brands, the line rental charge was for the use of open reach/bt lines which was a charge that Virgin media passed over to their customers.

However now that these lines are no longer being used, we should not be charged. Your argument of line use is invalid since we are paying for the use of broadband.

Regards to renting a “line” I want to be provided evidence of what’s being used and why there’s a cost behind it.

The line rental, if one ever existed ie you’re renting something from open reach/bt even without the line - should be explained and to why the cost is still ridiculously high although there’s now one less line to manage.

I’ll be reaching out to various media corps in meanwhile to get a definitive answer as I believe this needs to be scrutinised further. 

[nodrogd]

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@Shahin007 wrote:

I want this answer from Virgin staff please, not from mods or folks who are pretending to know what they’re saying.

From my understanding from working with competing brands, the line rental charge was for the use of open reach/bt lines which was a charge that Virgin media passed over to their customers.

Wrong. Virgin Media have their own telephone exchanges at their cable headends. Their telephone service pre-dates the creation of Openreach & the unbundling of the local loop where other companies were allowed to install their own kit at BT exchanges. You are paying for using Virgin equipment, not Openreach.

However now that these lines are no longer being used, we should not be charged. Your argument of line use is invalid since we are paying for the use of broadband.

You ARE still using the old exchange infrastructure, that your line always has. All that has changed is that the separate copper pair between your master socket & the local fibre node a few streets away (where the connection has always been fibre back to the exchange) now uses your hub for that part of the transmission.

Regards to renting a “line” I want to be provided evidence of what’s being used and why there’s a cost behind it.

You were using a PSTN exchange. You are still using a PSTN exchange. The call you make do not use the internet. They use a separate IP tunnel back to the Virgin exchange where the calls are converted back to analogue for onward routing. All that has been replaced is one piece of wire.

The line rental, if one ever existed ie you’re renting something from open reach/bt even without the line - should be explained and to why the cost is still ridiculously high although there’s now one less line to manage.

As per my earlier answer. You are actually paying for a Home Phone service. Line Rental is a misnomer, as it is actually against OFCOM rules to state a separate charge for this now

I’ll be reaching out to various media corps in meanwhile to get a definitive answer as I believe this needs to be scrutinised further. 

You are unlikely to get very far. All packages have some included calls attached. The base price will not drop until 2025 when the PSTN exchange infrastructure is shut down for entire areas (Virgin & Openreach) in a synchronised event.

I am not Virgin staff, but I do have industry connections & knowledge/records going back to the initial building of the cable networks back in the early 1990s.

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[Roger_Gooner]

The last time I had a bill which itemised the cost of phone rental (£19.00) was in April 2019.